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EU to create new quarantine system for Mediterranean migrants
Source: The Guardian
EU to create new quarantine system for Mediterranean migrants
Ian Traynor in Brussels
Tuesday 23 June 2015 17.23 BST
EU leaders have decided to create a new system of quarantining migrants in southern Italy and Greece to enable the forcible and swift registration, fingerprinting, expulsion, and, if necessary, detention for up to 18 months of those deemed to be illegal immigrants crossing the Mediterranean from Libya.
A summit of EU leaders on Thursday is to grapple with the Mediterranean refugee crisis and is likely to give EU police and border control agencies beefed up powers to use coercion in dealing with the influx in an attempt to increase the numbers of those sent back whence they came.
Draft documents prepared for the summit, obtained by the Guardian and unlikely to be changed, say that the government leaders have decided to establish “structured border zones and facilities in the frontline member states (Italy, Greece, Malta), with the active support of member states’ experts to ensure the swift identification, registration and fingerprinting of migrants.”
Under proposals from the European commission for the summit, the EU’s borders agency, Frontex, is to be granted new powers to initiate and carry out forced deportations. At the moment such action and decisions can only be taken by national authorities. The proposals were spelled out earlier this month in a letter to EU interior ministers from Dimitris Avramopoulos, the commissioner for migration.
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Ian Traynor in Brussels
Tuesday 23 June 2015 17.23 BST
EU leaders have decided to create a new system of quarantining migrants in southern Italy and Greece to enable the forcible and swift registration, fingerprinting, expulsion, and, if necessary, detention for up to 18 months of those deemed to be illegal immigrants crossing the Mediterranean from Libya.
A summit of EU leaders on Thursday is to grapple with the Mediterranean refugee crisis and is likely to give EU police and border control agencies beefed up powers to use coercion in dealing with the influx in an attempt to increase the numbers of those sent back whence they came.
Draft documents prepared for the summit, obtained by the Guardian and unlikely to be changed, say that the government leaders have decided to establish “structured border zones and facilities in the frontline member states (Italy, Greece, Malta), with the active support of member states’ experts to ensure the swift identification, registration and fingerprinting of migrants.”
Under proposals from the European commission for the summit, the EU’s borders agency, Frontex, is to be granted new powers to initiate and carry out forced deportations. At the moment such action and decisions can only be taken by national authorities. The proposals were spelled out earlier this month in a letter to EU interior ministers from Dimitris Avramopoulos, the commissioner for migration.
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Read more: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jun/23/eu-to-create-new-quarantine-system-for-mediterranean-migrants